Paper short abstract

Stylistic and linguistic details in the illustrated handscroll the Book of Acolytes raise questions around its presumed firm date of 1321. I suggest that the work is a 17th century product assembled from various preexisting illustrated sources to appeal to early modern viewers.

Paper long abstract

The illustrated handscroll the Book of Acolytes (Chigo no sōshi) survives as the most explicit depiction of male-male sexual practices among the Buddhist clergy. Its colophon notes that it was made as a copy of a now-lost original in 1321, making it the earliest erotic shunga painting in Japan. As such, the Book of Acolytes forms a crucial source for understanding the history of gender, sexuality and the development of Japanese erotic art. However, close analysis of both linguistic and stylistic details of the work renders this date problematic. I argue that rather than surviving as an unaltered original work, the handscroll is likely an assemblage of pre-existing illustrations compiled as a single scroll in the 17th century, with its literary content added at that time. By reconsidering the Book of Acolytes as an early modern anthology of erotic illustrations, the work reflects how early modern viewers understood medieval romances between Buddhist monks and temple acolytes.

Despite its importance to both art history and gender studies, specialists in medieval Japanese art have largely overlooked the work due to necessity—the painting remains held in secret at Daigo-ji and has not been shown to researchers since the early 20th century. As only three fragmentary photographs of Daigo-ji’s scroll have been published, recent scholarship relies on later copies of the work. Through a close examination of anachronisms present in all three surviving copies—and presumably Daigo-ji’s original—I argue that these details point to the work being an assemblage of unrelated fragments. Furthermore, I demonstrate the unusual nature of the Book of Acolytes by comparing it to the Buddhist depictions of male-male sexual practices in the Keiran shūyōshū (1318) as well as the secular romances from the anthology Rock Azaleas (1676). I conclude that the Book of Acolytes was compiled out of an interest in collecting medieval romances that highlighted eroticism over any Buddhist interpretations. By including a medieval date within the painting, early modern artists created an erotic fantasy of the past, imagining the historical romances between monks and acolytes in ways that appealed to early-modern erotic sensibilities.